


Rodney Faces Reality

by RosiePaw



Category: Stargate Atlantis
Genre: M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2010-01-01
Updated: 2010-01-01
Packaged: 2017-10-05 15:06:40
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,819
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/43018
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/RosiePaw/pseuds/RosiePaw





	Rodney Faces Reality

Rodney had always suspected it would come to this.  Although often accused of pessimism, he preferred to think of himself as being honest and realistic.  And honestly?  Realistically?  He knew he wasn’t an easy person to _work_ with, let alone _live_ with.  Rodney himself was of the opinion that the difficulties involved were _more_ than outweighed by his _numerous_ positive characteristics.  However, he was also painfully aware that this sort of evaluation was extremely subjective and that not everyone agreed with him.  As Jeannie had once put it, he was no John Sheppard.

Which was just as well, because John Sheppard came with his own set of quirks, issues and baggage.  Rodney knew this from firsthand experience as John’s – boyfriend?  Lover?  Had they graduated to being partners yet?  He’d never quite gotten up the nerve to broach the subject with John.  Now, it seemed as if the distinction was about to become irrelevant.

Rodney had been _trying_, he really had.  And John, to give him credit, had been trying too.  And sometimes – most times, even – it worked.  Really, _really_ worked, with each of them bringing out the best in the other.  But there were also times when their collective insecurities and ineptitudes collided painfully.  If their moments of synergy had given Rodney some of his fondest memories, the moments of collision had given him some of his worst.

 The hardest thing about the current situation was that they hadn’t _collided_, really.  A collision would have required converging paths.  Theirs seemed to be _di_verging.

It had started with the mission to MG3-916.  The mission that Rodney had _not_ been included on.  The mission that he hadn’t even been _told_ about and wouldn’t even have _known_ of except that idiot Morrison had triggered a power failure in the middle of a complicated simulation and then _not told_ anyone about it.  Probably thought that if he got the power up and running again quickly enough no one would notice.  Ha! 

Instead of spending the day as he’d planned, happily analyzing the simulation results, Rodney had wasted the morning setting the simulation back up again from scratch and reinitializing it.  Even after he’d finished chewing Morrison into small pieces and jumping up and down on them, he still had hours to wait.  So he’d radioed John to ask if he wanted to meet for lunch.  And that’s how he found out that his team leader – not to mention his boyfriend/lover/maybe-almost-partner – had gone offworld _without_ telling him.  That John _had_ taken Ronon and Teyla was reassuring in terms of John’s safety and survival but somehow made the whole thing worse in a personal sense.  Why them?  Why not Rodney?

The string of excuses, each lamer than the last, added to Rodney’s hurt.  “Easy mission – milk run.”  Translation: didn’t need you, left you behind. 

“Thought you’d be busy in the labs all day.”  So I didn’t bother to ask if you’d want to go.

“It was mostly a shopping trip to this market Teyla told us about.”

The last rankled particularly.  Who knows what pieces of scavenged Ancient tech might have been on offer?  Pieces that _he_ would have ferreted out if he’d been there except that he _hadn’t_ been because no one had told him there even _was_ a mission.  Hell, Conan could have walked right past an entire tableful of ZPMs without noticing, Lt. Colonel Hairforce wasn’t much better and Teyla...  Okay, Teyla was reasonably observant.  And he might be exaggerating just a bit about John.  But John should _still_ have told Rodney about the mission.  _And_ included him in it.

But it wasn’t just the mission.  In its aftermath, Rodney began to notice other odd things going on.  John holding conversations that stopped when he became aware of Rodney’s presence.  John walking into his quarters one day while Rodney was turning the place upside-down, stopping dead in his tracks and then _bellowing_, “McKay!  What the hell?”  And then immediately going all too fake-calm and apologizing and saying it was nothing and was there anything in particular Rodney was looking for?

Rodney had, in fact, been trying to find _one_ pair of matching socks.  He had located seven socks in his own quarters, none of which matched with each other.  The logical next place to look was John’s quarters, because by now, cross-migration and the second law of thermodynamics had seriously eroded the distinction between _John’s_ quarters and _Rodney’s_ quarters.  In reality they had _shared_ quarters which happened to be located in two different places.  They’d long since coded both doors to open to either of them. 

They’d discussed merging their quarters at one location.  After all, now that DADT had been repealed, it wouldn’t have been a problem.  They’d even gone on a few scouting trips to look over likely spots, arguing the whole time over the relative importance of balconies versus hot tubs.  But then other events would take precedence – explosions, invasions, deadly viruses, the usual – and the whole quarters issue would get set aside.

To make a long story short, Rodney had _every_ reason to think that his missing socks might be keeping company with John’s T-shirts – possibly on the closet floor or underneath the bed – while John had _no_ reason to react as if Rodney were some sort of intruder.  And no reason to be holding surreptitious conversations.  And no reason to be letting Rodney catch him _watching_ Rodney with a strange expression which suggested either that Rodney had grown a second head which John was too polite to comment on or that John was feeling queasy.

If Rodney had _only_ started noticing this after the mission that he’d _only_ found out about due to Morrison’s screw-up, how long had it actually been going on?  It was just as well that he and John had never gone the merged-quarters route.  Just sorting out their merged crap from their _separate_ quarters was going to be enough of a pain in the ass.  And, to be truthful, higher up.  Like in the chest.

So Rodney was not surprised, no, he was not surprised _at all_ when he walked into his quarters – his _own_ quarters – one evening to find John waiting for him.  To Rodney’s eye, John looked tense and unhappy.  For one thing he stood up when Rodney entered the room, an unprecedented formality.  In fact, he stood up _straight_, without slouching or leaning.  The expression on his face suggested that he’d gone beyond queasy and was approaching active nausea.

“So, I was trying to think of a better place to do this, but I couldn’t,” John began.

“There really isn’t any good place to do this, Sheppard.”

 “Right.”  John gave him a decisive nod.  “You and I, we’ve been... doing this thing for a while now.”  He now seemed to be staring at something of interest just over Rodney’s left shoulder.

“This thing.”  Rodney kept his tone dry.

“Yeah, the thing where we’re, uh.  It’s been a while now.  And, uh, I know it hasn’t always been smooth going.”  John looked directly at Rodney again.  Another nod.  “I’ve been trying really hard.”

“So you’re saying that it’s _my_ fault we’re having this discussion.”

John _smiled_, the bastard.  It was even a _shy_, _sweet_ sort of smile.  “Yeah, I guess.  Except I wasn’t really thinking of it as anyone’s fault.  More like... it’s just how things turned out.”

“Fate.  Destiny.”  John’s smiles and nods were getting on Rodney’s nerves.  “That’s bullshit, Sheppard!  Deterministic _crap_!  This situation is the result of the choices we’ve made and the actions we’ve undertaken.”

John’s face turned grave.  “You’re right, buddy.”

“The choices we’ve _both_ made.  So if you’re suggesting that it’s my fault alone...”

“No, I see your point, it’s both of us.  And, uh, I was kind of joking about the ‘fault’ thing.”

“Oh, so you think this is all a joke!”

“No!  It’s important!  It’s one of the most important...  Look, I meant that saying it was anyone’s ‘fault’ was a joke.  And you started it, anyway.”

“Okay, now it’s my fault that you’re saying it’s my fault?!”

“Yeah!  I mean, no!  I mean, uh, can we just drop the whole ‘fault’ concept?  That’s not what’s going on here.”

“Fine.  What _is_ going on here, Sheppard?  Is there someone else?”

“No!”  John’s surprise appeared to be real.  Damn, thought Rodney, it would have been almost nice to be traded in for _some_one instead of _no_ one.  “You’re... kind of unique.”

Unique, right.  Uniquely _what_ unspecified, of course, but Rodney could guess.  And there was that _smile_ on John’s face again.  Rodney knew just how to wipe it off and didn’t hesitate.

“_Tell_ me, Sheppard.  Use _words_.  What’s going on here?”

Nauseated look, right on cue.  Oh yeah, Rodney had read this situation correctly.

“What’s going on here is...  Remember the time you and I had to enter a dance contest to win a ZPM?”

“A _dance contest_?!”

“Yeah, when you were trying to teach me how to tango?  What’s going on here is that maybe it’s time for us to change dances.”

“’Change dances.’  What a poetic way to put it,” Rodney sneered.  Sheppard, the rat bastard, looked proud of himself.  Rodney had had enough.

“As they say, Sheppard, it takes two to tango but only one to walk away.”

“Exactly.”  Now John was looking proud _and_ smiling _and_ nodding.

“So why don’t we just go ahead and get this over with before you lose your nerve.”

“Right.”  John took a deep breath, dug into a pocket, pulled something out and thrust it at Rodney.  Rodney grabbed it reflexively before glancing down at the small box that looked something like...  Actually it looked like a jewellery box.

“John?”

The smile was starting to slip towards nausea again.  Rodney decided he’d better open the damn box.

Oh.

Rings.

Two rings, one slight larger than the other.  Silvery metal with a wave design engraved in black.

“MG3-916.  Teyla said it would be a good place to look.  She and Ronon helped me pick ‘em out.”  John was looking proud again.

“You snuck out on me to go shopping for rings with Teyla and Ronon.”

“Uh, yeah?  I wanted to surprise you.”

“You did.  You definitely did.  I thought you...  John, come here.  No, wait a moment, let me put these down, I don’t want to drop them.  _Now_ come here...”

When Rodney finally got around to picking the box back up, John draped himself over Rodney’s shoulder to look at the rings with him.

“The guy who sold them to me said we might want to get something engraved on the inside.  But I couldn’t think of the right words.”

“Words, yes, I can see how that would be a problem for you.  You’re lucky _I_ understand what you’re trying to say.”

“Yeah, Rodney, I am.”  And John’s shy, sweet smile warmed Rodney from the crown of head to his toes.


End file.
